the Week of Proper 22 / Ordinary 27
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Genesis 12:1
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And Yahweh said to Abram,"Go forth from your land,And from your kinAnd from your father's house,To the land which I will show you;
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go forth from your country, And from your relatives And from your father's house, To the land which I will show you;
And the Lord had sayde vnto Abram: get thee out of thy coutrey, and out of thy nation, and from thy fathers house, vnto a lande that I wyll shewe thee:
The Lord said to Abram, "Leave your country and your people. Leave your father's family and go to the country that I will show you.
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.
Forsothe the Lord seide to Abram, Go thou out of thi lond, and of thi kynrede, and of the hous of thi fadir, and come thou in to the lond which Y schal schewe to thee;
Now the LORD had said vnto Abram, Get thee out of thy countrey, and from thy kinred, and from thy fathers house, vnto a land that I will shew thee.
Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee:
And ye LORDE sayde vnto Abram: Get the out of thy countre, and from thy kynred, and out of thy fathers house, in to a londe which I wil shew the.
God told Abram: "Leave your country, your family, and your father's home for a land that I will show you.
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country, And from your relatives And from your father's house, To the land which I will show you;
Now Jehovah said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto the land that I will show thee:
Now the Lord said to Abram, Go out from your country and from your family and from your father's house, into the land to which I will be your guide:
Now Yahweh said to Abram, Get out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father's house, to the land that I will show you:
Now the LORD had said to Abram, Depart from thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, to a land that I will show thee:
Now Yahweh said to Abram, "Get out of your country, and from your relatives, and from your father's house, to the land that I will show you.
Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go out from your country, your relatives, and your father's household to the land that I will show you.
Acts 7:2-5">[xr] Now the LORD had said to Abram: "Get out of your country, From your family And from your father's house, To a land that I will show you.
The Lord said to Abram: Leave your country, your family, and your relatives and go to the land that I will show you.
Now Adonai said to Avram, "Get yourself out of your country, away from your kinsmen and away from your father's house, and go to the land that I will show you.
And Jehovah had said to Abram, Go out of thy land, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, to the land that I will shew thee.
For the Lorde had said vnto Abram, Get thee out of thy countrey, and from thy kindred, and from thy fathers house vnto the land that I will shewe thee.
NOW the LORD said to Abram, Depart from your country, and from the place of your nativity, and from your fathers house, to a land that I will show you;
The Lord said to Abram, "Leave your country, your relatives, and your father's home, and go to a land that I am going to show you.
Now the LORD said to Avram, "Get out of your country, and from your relatives, and from your father's house, to the land that I will show you.
Now the LORD said unto Abram: 'Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto the land that I will show thee.
The Lord had said to Abram, "Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father's family, and go to the land that I will show you.
Now the Lord said to Abram, "Leave your country, your family and your father's house, and go to the land that I will show you.
Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.
And the Lord said to Abram, Go forth out of thy land and out of thy kindred, and out of the house of thy father, and come into the land which I will shew thee.
Now the LORD said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto the land that I will shew thee:
Then the LORD said to Abram, "Leave your country, your kindred, and your father's household, and go to the land I will show you.
And Yahweh said unto Abram: Come thou on thy way, Out of thy land and out of the place of thy birth and out of the house of thy father, - Unto the land that I will show thee;
And the Lord said to Abram: Go forth out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and out of thy father’s house, and come into the land which I shall shew thee.
And Yahweh said to Abram, "Go out from your land and from your relatives, and from the house of your father, to the land that I will show you.
And Jehovah had said to Abram, Go out from your land and from your kindred, and from your father's house, to the land which I will show you.
Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.
The Lord said to Abram, "Leave your country, your relatives, and your father's family, and go to the land I will show you.
The Lord said to Abram: Go out from your land, your relatives, and your father's house to the land that I will show you.
And Jehovah saith unto Abram, `Go for thyself, from thy land, and from thy kindred, and from the house of thy father, unto the land which I shew thee.
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
had: Genesis 11:31, Genesis 11:32, Genesis 15:7, Nehemiah 9:7, Isaiah 41:9, Isaiah 51:2, Ezekiel 33:24
Get: Joshua 24:2, Joshua 24:3, Psalms 45:10, Psalms 45:11, Luke 14:26-33, Acts 7:2-6, 2 Corinthians 6:17, Hebrews 11:8, Revelation 18:4
Reciprocal: Genesis 9:26 - the Lord Genesis 15:2 - what Genesis 17:1 - the Lord Genesis 20:13 - God Genesis 24:4 - to my kindred Genesis 24:7 - took Genesis 24:38 - But Genesis 26:2 - dwell Genesis 26:3 - unto thee Genesis 28:4 - the blessing Genesis 40:5 - General Exodus 3:6 - I am Exodus 3:18 - met Exodus 12:40 - four hundred Numbers 10:30 - General Nehemiah 9:8 - foundest Song of Solomon 2:10 - Rise Isaiah 41:2 - Who raised Matthew 20:5 - and did Mark 10:29 - There Acts 7:3 - Get Acts 13:17 - God Hebrews 1:1 - at
Cross-References
And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you [abundantly], And make your name great (exalted, distinguished); And you shall be a blessing [a source of great good to others];
And I will bless (do good for, benefit) those who bless you, And I will curse [that is, subject to My wrath and judgment] the one who curses (despises, dishonors, has contempt for) you. And in you all the families (nations) of the earth will be blessed."
Abram passed through the land as far as the site of Shechem, to the [great] terebinth (oak) tree of Moreh. Now the Canaanites were in the land at that time.
Now there was a famine in the land; and Abram went down into Egypt to live temporarily, for the famine in the land was oppressive and severe.
And when he was about to enter Egypt, he said to Sarai his wife, "Listen: I know that you are a beautiful woman;
And He said to him, "I am the [same] LORD who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land as an inheritance."
"You are the LORD God, Who chose Abram And brought him out of Ur of the Chaldees, And gave him the name Abraham.
You whom I [the LORD] have taken from the ends of the earth, And called from its remotest parts And said to you, 'You are My servant, I have chosen you and have not rejected you [even though you are exiled].
"Look to Abraham your father And to Sarah who gave birth to you in pain; For I called him when he was but one, Then I blessed him and made him many."
"Son of man, those [back in Palestine] who inhabit these ruins in the land of Israel are saying, 'Abraham was [only] one man and he took possession of the land, but we are many; the land has [most certainly] been given to us [to possess] as property.'
Gill's Notes on the Bible
Now the Lord had said unto Abram,.... In Ur of the Chaldees, before he came and dwelt in Charran, as seems from Acts 7:2 and so Aben Ezra interprets it; but Jarchi and others think, that what follows was said to him in Haran, and so the words may be more literally rendered u, "and the Lord said unto Abram"; after the death of Terah, who died in Haran; and indeed it is highly probable there were two appearances of God to Abram, and that the same words, or very near the same, were spoken to him at two several times, first in Ur of the Chaldees, and then in Haran:
get thee out of thy country; the land of Chaldea, and the city of Ur, which was in it, or out of Mesopotamia, in which, when taken in a large sense, were both Ur and Haran; and this country was now become idolatrous, for though it was first inhabited and peopled by the posterity of Shem in the time of Arphaxad, yet these, in process of time, degenerated from the true religion, and fell into idolatry. The same Maimonides w calls Zabaeans, in whose faith and religion, he says, Abram was brought up, and who asserted there was no other God but the sun, moon, and stars; and these Zabaeans, as he relates from their books and annals, say of Abram themselves, that he was educated in Cuthia, and dissented from the common people; and asserted, that besides the sun, there was another Creator; to whom they objected, and so disputes arose among them on this subject: now Abram being convinced of idolatry, is called out from those people, and to have no fellowship with them; it is literally in the Hebrew text x, "go to thee out of thy country"; for thy profit and good, as Jarchi interprets it; as it must be to quit all society with such an idolatrous and superstitious people:
and from thy kindred; as Nahor his brother, and his family, who are not mentioned, and seem to be left behind when Terah, Abram, Lot, and Sarai, came out of Ur of the Chaldees; though it looks as if afterwards Nahor did follow them to Haran or Padanaram, which are the same, and where he continued, and therefore is called his city; see Genesis 24:10 so with great propriety Abram might be called a second time to leave his kindred as well as his country; and certain it is, Haran, or Padanaram, as well as Ur of the Chaldees, is called by himself his country, and Nahor and his family his kindred,
Genesis 24:4
and from thy father's house; or household, his family, which better agrees with the second call at Haran, than with the first at Ur; for, upon the first call, Terah and his family came along with Abram, and therefore this phrase is omitted by Stephen, who speaks of that call, Acts 7:3 but Terah dying at Haran, his house or family went no further, but continued there with Nahor; only Abram and Lot, upon this second call, went from thence, as the following history makes it appear; and so Abram left, as he was bid, his father's house and family to go, as it follows:
unto a land that I will show thee; meaning the land of Canaan, though not mentioned, and seems to be omitted for the trial of Abram's faith; hence the author of the epistle to the Hebrews, Hebrews 11:8 observes, that "he obeyed and went out, not knowing whither he went"; and yet it is said, that, when he and Terah came out of Ur of the Chaldees, "they went forth to go into the land of Canaan",
Genesis 11:31 and, when he and Lot went first from Haran, the same is said of them, Genesis 12:5 it is probable the case was this; there was no mention made at first what land he was to go to, and when he prepared for his journey he knew not where he was to go, but afterwards it was revealed to him that Canaan was the land, and therefore set out in order to go thither; and still, though he might know the place by name where he was to go, he might neither know the way to it, nor what sort of country it was for quality or quantity; and therefore God promises to show him the way, and direct his course right unto it, and give him a view of it, that he might see what sort of a country, and how large it was, that he would give to his posterity. This call of Abram is an emblem of the call of men by the grace of God out of the world, and from among the men of it, and to renounce the things of it, and not be conformed unto it, and to forget their own people and their father's house, and to cleave to the Lord, and follow him whithersoever he directs them.
u ××××ר "et dixit", Pagninus, Montanus, Cocceius. w More Nevochim, par. 3. c. 29. p. 421. x ×× ×× "vade tibi", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus, Drusius, &c.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
- The Call of Abram
6. ש××× shekem Shekem, âthe upper part of the back.â Here it is the name of a person, the owner of this place, where afterward is built the town called at first Shekem, then Flavia Neapolis, and now Nablous. ×××× 'eÌloÌn âthe oak;â related: âbe lasting, strong.â ×××¨× moÌreh In Onkelos âplain;â Moreh, âarcher, early rain, teacher.â Here the name of a man who owned the oak that marked the spot. In the Septuagint it is rendered Ï ÌÏηγηÌν hupseegeen.
8. ××ת־×× beÌyt-'eÌl, Bethel, âhouse of God.â ×× yam âsea, great river, west.â ×¢× âay, âAi, âheap.â
9. × ×× negeb âsouth.â
The narrative now takes leave of the rest of the Shemites, as well as the other branches of the human family, and confines itself to Abram. It is no part of the design of Scripture to trace the development of worldliness. It marks its source, and indicates the law of its downward tendency; but then it turns away from the dark detail, to devote its attention to the way by which light from heaven may again pierce the gloom of the fallen heart. Here, then, we have the starting of a new spring of spiritual life in the human race.
Genesis 12:1-3
Having brought the affairs of Terahâs family to a fit resting point, the sacred writer now reverts to the call of Abram. This, we have seen, took place when he was seventy years of age, and therefore five years before the death of Terah. âThe Lord said unto Abram.â Four hundred and twenty-two years on the lowest calculation after the last recorded communication with Noah, the Lord again opens his mouth, to Abram. Noah, Shem, or Heber, must have been in communication with heaven, indeed, at the time of the confusion of tongues, and hence, we have an account of that miraculous interposition. The call of Abram consists of a command and a promise. The command is to leave the place of all his old and fond associations, for a land which he had not yet seen, and therefore did not know. Three ties are to be severed in complying with this command - his country, in the widest range of his affections; his place of birth and kindred comes closer to his heart; his fatherâs house is the inmost circle of all his tender emotions. All these are to be resigned; not, however, without reason. The reason may not be entirely obvious to the mind of Abram. But he has entire faith in the reasonableness of what God proposes. So with reason and faith he is willing to go to the unknown land. It is enough that God will show him the land to which he is now sent.
Genesis 12:2-3
The promise corresponds to the command. If he is to lose much by his exile, he will also gain in the end. The promise contains a lower and higher blessing. The lower blessing has three parts: âFirst, I will make of thee a great nation.â This will compensate for the loss of his country. The nation to which he had hitherto belonged was fast sinking into polytheism and idolatry. To escape from it and its defiling influence was itself a benefit; but to be made himself the head of a chosen nation was a double blessing. Secondly, âAnd bless thee.â The place of his birth and kindred was the scene of all his past earthly joys. But the Lord will make up the loss to him in a purer and safer scene of temporal prosperity. Thirdly, âAnd make thy name great.â This was to compensate him for his fatherâs house. He was to be the patriarch of a new house, on account of which he would be known and venerated all over the world.
The higher blessing is expressed in these remarkable terms: âAnd be thou a blessing.â He is to be not merely a subject of blessing, but a medium of blessing to others. It is more blessed to give than to receive. And the Lord here confers on Abram the delightful prerogative of dispensing good to others. The next verse expands this higher element of the divine promise. âI will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee.â Here the Lord identifies the cause of Abram with his own, and declares him to be essentially connected with the weal or woe of all who come into contact with him. âAnd blessed in thee shall be all the families of the ground.â The ground was cursed for the sake of Adam, who fell by transgression. But now shall the ground again participate in the blessing. âIn thee.â In Abram is this blessing laid up as a treasure hid in a field to be realized in due time. âAll the familiesâ of mankind shall ultimately enter into the enjoyment of this unbounded blessing.
Thus, when the Lord saw fit to select a man to preserve vital piety on the earth and be the head of a race suited to be the depository of a revelation of mercy, he at the same time designed that this step should be the means of effectually recalling the sin-enthralled world to the knowledge and love of himself. The race was twice already since the fall put upon its probation - once under the promise of victory to the seed of the woman, and again under the covenant with Noah. In each of these cases, notwithstanding the growing light of revelation and accumulating evidence of the divine forbearance, the race had apostatised from the God of mercy, with lamentably few known exceptions. Yet, undeterred by the gathering tokens of this second apostasy, and after reiterated practical demonstration to all people of the debasing, demoralizing effect of sin, the Lord, with calm determination of purpose, sets about another step in the great process of removing the curse of sin, dispensing the blessing of pardon, and eventually drawing all the nations to accept of his mercy. The special call of Abram contemplates the calling of the Gentiles as its final issue, and is therefore to be regarded as one link in a series of wonderful events by which the legal obstacles to the divine mercy are to be taken out of the way, and the Spirit of the Lord is to prevail with still more and more of men to return to God.
It is sometimes inadvertently said that the Old Testament is narrow and exclusive, while the New Testament is broad and catholic in its spirit. This is a mistake. The Old and New Testaments are of one mind on this matter. Many are called, and few chosen. This is the common doctrine of the New as well as of the Old. They are both equally catholic in proclaiming the gospel to all. The covenant with Adam and with Noah is still valid and sure to all who return to God; and the call of Abram is expressly said to be a means of extending blessing to all the families of man. The New Testament does not aim at anything more than this; it merely hails the approaching accomplishment of the same gracious end. They both concur also in limiting salvation to the few who repent and believe the gospel. Even when Abram was called there were a few who still trusted in the God of mercy. According to the chronology of the Masoretic text, Heber was still alive, Melkizedec was contemporary with Abram, Job was probably later, and many other now unknown witnesses for God were doubtless to be found, down to the time of the exodus, outside the chosen family. God marks the first symptoms of decaying piety. He does not wait until it has died out before he calls Abram. He proceeds in a leisurely, deliberate manner with his eternal purpose of mercy, and hence, a single heir of promise suffices for three generations, until the set time comes for the chosen family and the chosen nation. Universalism, then, in the sense of the offer of mercy to man, is the rule of the Old and the New Testament. Particularism in the acceptance of it is the accident of the time. The call of Abram is a special expedient for providing a salvation that may be offered to all the families of the earth.
In all Godâs teachings the near and the sensible come before the far and the conceivable, the present and the earthly before the eternal and the heavenly. Thus, Abramâs immediate acts of self-denial are leaving his country, his birthplace, his home. The promise to him is to be made a great nation, be blessed, and have a great name in the new land which the Lord would show him. This is unspeakably enhanced by his being made a blessing to all nations. God pursues this mode of teaching for several important reasons. First, the sensible and the present are intelligible to those who are taught. The Great Teacher begins with the known, and leads the mind forward to the unknown. If he had begun with things too high, too deep, or too far for the range of Abramâs mental vision, he would not have come into relation with Abramâs mind. It is superfluous to say that he might have enlarged Abramâs view in proportion to the grandeur of the conceptions to be revealed.
On the same principle he might have made Abram cognizant of all present and all developed truth. On the same principle he might have developed all things in an instant of time, and so have had done with creation and providence at once. Secondly, the present and the sensible are the types of the future and the conceivable; the land is the type of the better land; the nation of the spiritual nation; the temporal blessing of the eternal blessing; the earthly greatness of the name of the heavenly. And let us not suppose that we are arrived at the end of all knowledge. We pique ourselves on our advance in spiritual knowledge beyond the age of Abram. But even we may be in the very infancy of mental development. There may be a land, a nation, a blessing, a great name, of which our present realizations or conceptions are but the types. Any other supposition would be a large abatement from the sweetness of hopeâs overflowing cup.
Thirdly, these things which God now promises are the immediate form of his bounty, the very gifts he begins at the moment to bestow. God has his gift to Abram ready in his hand in a tangible form. He points to it and says, This is what thou presently needest; this I give thee, with my blessing and favor. But, fourthly, these are the earnest and the germ of all temporal and eternal blessing. Man is a growing thing, whether as an individual or a race. God graduates his benefits according to the condition and capacity of the recipients. In the first boon of his good-will is the earnest of what he will continue to bestow on those who continue to walk in his ways. And as the present is the womb of the future, so is the external the symbol of the internal, the material the shadow of the spiritual, in the order of the divine blessing. And as events unfold themselves in the history of man and conceptions in his soul within, so are doctrines gradually opened up in the Word of God, and progressively revealed to the soul by the Spirit of God.
Genesis 12:4-5
Abram obeys the call. He had set out from Ur under the revered guardianship of his aged father, Terah, with other companions, âas the Lord had spoken unto him.â Lot is now mentioned as his companion. Terahâs death has been already recorded. Sarai is with him, of course, and therefore it is unnecessary to repeat the fact. But Lot is associated with him as an incidental companion for some time longer. The age of Abram at the second stage of his journey is now mentioned. This enables us to determine, as, we have seen, that he departed from Ur five years before.
Genesis 12:5
This is the record of what is presumed in the close of Genesis 12:4; namely, the second setting out for Kenaan. âAbram took.â He is now the leader of the little colony, as Terah was before his death. Sarai, as well as Lot, is now named. âThe gaining they had gainedâ during the five years of their residence in Haran. If Jacob became comparatively rich in six years Genesis 30:43, so might Abram, with the divine blessing, in five. âThe souls they had gottenâ - the bondservants they had acquired. Where there is a large stock of cattle, there must be a corresponding number of servants to attend to them. Abram and Lot enter the land as men of substance. They are in a position of independence. The Lord is realizing to Abram the blessing promised. They start for the land of Kenaan, and at length arrive there. This event is made as important as it ought to be in our minds by the mode in which it is stated.
Genesis 12:6-9
Abram does not enter into immediate possession, but only travels through the land which the Lord had promised to show him Genesis 12:1. He arrives at âthe place of Shekem.â The town was probably not yet in existence. It lay between Mount Gerizzim and Mount Ebal. It possesses a special interest as the spot where the Lord first appeared to Abram in the land of promise. It was afterward dedicated to the Lord by being made a Levitical town, and a city of refuge. At this place Joshua convened an assembly of all Israel to hear his farewell address. âSo Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and set them a statute and an ordinance in Shekemâ Joshua 24:1-25. The particular point in the place of Shekem where Abram halted is the oak of Moreh; so called, probably, from its planter or owner. The oak attains to great antiquity, and a single tree, well grown, becomes conspicuous for its grandeur and beauty, and was often chosen in ancient times as a meeting-place for religious rites.
And the Kenaanite was then in the land. - This simply implies that the land was not open for Abram to enter upon immediate possession of it without challenge. Another was in possession. The sons of Kenaan had already arrived and preoccupied the country. It also intimates, or admits, of the supposition that there had been previous inhabitants who may have been subjugated by the invading Kenaanites. Thus, ×× 'aÌz then alludes to the past, as in Genesis 4:26. Some of these former inhabitants will meet us in the course of the narrative. It admits also of the supposition that the Kenaanites afterward ceased to be its inhabitants. Hence, some have inferred that this could not have been penned by Moses, as they were expelled after his death. If this supposition were the necessary or the only one implied in the form of expression, we should acquiesce in the conclusion that this sentence came from one of the prophets to whom the conservation, revision, and continuation of the living oracles were committed. But we have seen that two other presuppositions may be made that satisfy the import of the passage. Moreover, the first of the three accounts for the fact that Abram does not instantly enter on possession, as there was an occupying tenant. And, finally, the third supposition may fairly be, not that the Kenaanites afterward ceased, but that they should afterward cease to be in the land. This, then, as well as the others, admits of Moses being the writer of this interesting sentence.
We are inclined to think, however, that the term âKenaaniteâ here means, not the whole race of Kenaan, but the special tribe so called. If the former were meant, the statement would be in a manner superfluous, after calling the country the land of Kenaan. If the proper tribe be intended, then we have evidence here that they once possessed this part of the land which was afterward occupied by the Hivite and the Amorite Genesis 34:2; Joshua 11:3; for, at the time of the conquest by Abramâs descendants, the mountainous land in the center, including the place of Shekem, was occupied by the Amorites and other tribes, while the coast of the Mediterranean and the west bank of the Jordan was held by the Kenaanites proper (Josephus v. 1; xi. 3). This change of occupants had taken place before the time of Moses.
Genesis 12:7
And the Lord appeared unto Abram. - Here, for the first time, this remarkable phrase occurs. It indicates that the Lord presents himself to the consciousness of man in any way suitable to his nature. It is not confined to the sight, but may refer to the hearing 1 Samuel 3:15. The possibility of God appearing to man is antecedently undeniable. The fact of his having done so proves the possibility. On the mode of his doing this it is vain for us to speculate. The Lord said unto him, âUnto thy seed will I give this land.â âUnto thy seed,â not unto thee. To Abram himself âhe gave none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot onâ Acts 7:5. âThis landâ which the Lord had now shown him, though at present occupied by the Kenaanite invader. âAn altar.â This altar is erected on the spot which is hallowed by the appearance of the Lord to Abram. The place of Shekem might have been supposed to have received its name from Shekem, a son of Gilead Numbers 26:31, did we not meet with Shekem, the son of Hamor, in this very place in the time of Jacob Genesis 34:2. We learn from this the precariousness of the inference that the name of a place is of later origin because a person of that name lived there at a later period. The place of Shekem was doubtless called after a Shekem antecedent to Abram. Shekem and Moreh may have preceded even the Kenaanites, for anything we know.
Genesis 12:8-9
From the oak of Moreh Abram now moves to the hill east of Bethel, and pitches his tent, with âBethel on the west and Ai on the east.â These localities are still recognized - the former as Beiten, and the latter as Tell er-Rijmeh (the mount of the heap). Bethel was âa place,â adjacent to which was the town called âLuz at the firstâ Genesis 28:19. Jacob gave this name to the place twice Genesis 28:19; Genesis 35:15. The name, then, was not first given at the second nomination by him. It follows that it may not have been first given at his first nomination. Accordingly we meet with it as an existing name in Abramâs time, without being constrained to account for it by supposing the present narrative to have been composed in its present form after the time of Jacobâs visit. On the other hand, we may regard it as an interesting trace of early piety having been present in the land even before the arrival of Abram. We shall meet with other corroborating proofs. Bethel continued afterward to be a place hallowed by the presence of God, to which the people resorted for counsel in the war with Benjamin Judges 20:18, Judges 20:26, Judges 20:31; Judges 21:2, and in which Jeroboam set up one of the golden calves 1 Kings 12:29.
On the hill east of this sacred ground Abram built another altar; and called upon the name of the Lord. Here we bare the reappearance of an ancient custom, instituted in the family of Adam after the birth of Enok Genesis 4:26. Abram addresses God by his proper name, Yahweh, with an audible voice, in his assembled household. This, then, is a continuation of the worship of Adam, with additional light according to the progressive development of the moral nature of man. But Abram has not yet any settled abode in the land. He is only surveying its several regions, and feeding his flocks as he finds an opening. Hence, he continues his journey southward.
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
CHAPTER XII
God calls Abram to leave Haran and go into Canaan, 1;
promises to bless him, and through him all the families of
the earth, 2, 3.
Abram, Sarai, Lot, and all their household, depart from Canaan, 4, 5;
pass through Sichem, 6.
God appears to him, and renews the promise, 7.
His journey described, 8, 9.
On account of a famine in the land he is obliged to go into Egypt, 10.
Fearing lest, on account of the beauty of his wife, the Egyptians
should kill him, he desires her not to acknowledge that she is his
wife, but only his sister, 11-13.
Sarai, because of her beauty, is taken into the palace of Pharaoh,
king of Egypt, who is very liberal to Abram on her account, 14-16.
God afflicts Pharaoh and his household with grievous plagues on
account of Sarai, 17.
Pharaoh, on finding that Sarai was Abram's wife, restores her
honourably, and dismisses the patriarch with his family and their
property, 18-20.
NOTES ON CHAP. XII
Verse Genesis 12:1. Get thee out of thy country — There is great dissension between commentators concerning the call of Abram; some supposing he had two distinct calls, others that he had but one. At the conclusion of the preceding chapter, Genesis 11:31, we find Terah and all his family leaving Ur of the Chaldees, in order to go to Canaan. This was, no doubt, in consequence of some Divine admonition. While resting at Haran, on their road to Canaan, Terah died, Genesis 11:32; and then God repeats his call to Abram, and orders him to proceed to Canaan, Genesis 12:1.
Dr. Hales, in his Chronology, contends for two calls: "The first," says he, "is omitted in the Old Testament, but is particularly recorded in the New, Acts 7:2-4: The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham while he was (at Ur of the Chaldees) in Mesopotamia, BEFORE HE DWELT IN CHARRAN; and said unto him, Depart from thy land, and from thy kindred, and come into the land (γην, a land) which I will show thee. Hence it is evident that God had called Abram before he came to Haran or Charran." The SECOND CALL is recorded only in this chapter: "The Lord said (not HAD said) unto Abram, Depart from thy land, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto THE LAND, ××רץ HA-arets, (Septuagint, Την γην), which I will show thee." "The difference of the two calls," says Dr. Hales, "more carefully translated from the originals, is obvious: in the former the land is indefinite, which was designed only for a temporary residence; in the latter it is definite, intimating his abode. A third condition is also annexed to the latter, that Abram shall now separate himself from his father's house, or leave his brother Nahor's family behind at Charran. This call Abram obeyed, still not knowing whither he was going, but trusting implicitly to the Divine guidance."
Thy kindred — Nahor and the different branches of the family of Terah, Abram and Lot excepted. That Nahor went with Terah and Abram as far as Padan-Aram, in Mesopotamia, and settled there, so that it was afterwards called Nahor's city, is sufficiently evident from the ensuing history, see Genesis 25:20; Genesis 24:10; Genesis 24:15; and that the same land was Haran, see Genesis 28:2; Genesis 28:10, and there were Abram's kindred and country here spoken of, Genesis 24:4.
Thy father's house — Terah being now dead, it is very probable that the family were determined to go no farther, but to settle at Charran; and as Abram might have felt inclined to stop with them in this place, hence the ground and necessity of the second call recorded here, and which is introduced in a very remarkable manner; ×× ×× lech lecha, GO FOR THYSELF. If none of the family will accompany thee, yet go for thyself unto THAT LAND which I will show thee. God does not tell him what land it is, that he may still cause him to walk by faith and not by sight. This seems to be particularly alluded to by Isaiah, Isaiah 41:2: Who raised up the righteous man (Abram) from the east, and called him to his foot; that is, to follow implicitly the Divine direction. The apostle assures us that in all this Abram had spiritual views; he looked for a better country, and considered the land of promise only as typical of the heavenly inheritance.
